The Stores, Which Are Distinguished By A Flag, Are Numerous And Well
Stocked.
A new style of lodging and boarding house is in great vogue.
It is a tent fitted up with stringy bark couches, ranged down each side
the tent, leaving a narrow passage up the middle.
The lodgers are
supplied with mutton, damper, and tea, three times a day, for the
charge of 5s. a meal, and 5s. for the bed; this is by the week, a
casual guest must pay double, and as 18 inches is on an average
considered ample width to sleep in, a tent 24 feet long will bring in a
good return to the owner.
The stores at the diggings are large tents, generally square or oblong,
and everything required by a digger can be obtained for money, from
sugar-candy to potted anchovies; from East India pickles to Bass's pale
ale; from ankle jack boots to a pair of stays; from a baby's cap to a
cradle; and every apparatus for mining, from a pick to a needle. But
the confusion - the din - the medley - what a scene for a shop
walker! Here lies a pair of herrings dripping into a bag of sugar, or a
box of raisins; there a gay-looking bundle of ribbons beneath two
tumblers, and a half-finished bottle of ale. Cheese and butter, bread
and yellow soap, pork and currants, saddles and frocks, wide-awakes and
blue serge shirts, green veils and shovels, baby linen and tallow
candles, are all heaped indiscriminately together; added to which,
there are children bawling, men swearing, store-keeper sulky, and last,
not LEAST, women's tongues going nineteen to the dozen.
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